PARENTS across Wales are being urged to sign up to a campaign to save threatened rural schools.

A national petition was launched at the Royal Welsh Show by a new pressure group calling itself The Assocation of Small Schools in Wales (ASSW).

It hopes to exert parent pressure on county councils which are being asked to oversee a wave of school closures.

Current education policy adopted by local authorities could see schools with fewer than 90 pupils axed. Around 200 small schools in Wales could be affected.

Caernarfon AM Alun Ffred Jones, who was at the launch, slammed the Assembly's policy of "closure by numbers".

He said education strategy should have a broader focus which encompassed wider cultural needs.

He said: "When considering a school's value to its community, there is a need to look at its location, its catchment area and its linguistic nature.

"Even more importantly, there needs to be a proper age balance in communities. Along many stretches of the Gwynedd coastline we're seeing areas becoming dominated by older people moving into the community.

"This is something the Assembly has yet to get to grips with."

Members of ASSW include the Farmers Union of Wales, Campaign for the Protection of Rural Wales, Wales YFC, Merched y Wawr, the National Federation of Women's Institutes and the Small Welsh Schools Fund.

The latter was set up in January by a group of angry parents from Pembrokeshire who fought and lost a High Court action to change education policy in Wales.

SWSF chairman Cris Tomos said: "We aim to have 500 members by the end of the year and so far 105 have signed up.

"Each will be asked to contribute £1 a week, and half the funds will be used to employ lawyers and lobbyists to fight for us."

FUW president Gareth Vaughan said ASSW would collectively represent the views of 65,000 people in Wales.

He added: "Closing down a school rips the heart and soul out of rural areas and it is vital that anyone who disagrees with this policy signs this petition."

Rhiannon Dafydd, Wales YFC chairman, said village schools had the added benefit of providing much-needed rural employment, not just for teachers but for ancillary staff like cooks and caretakers.

Alun Ffred Jones, whose own school in Llanwchllyn, Bala, had seen pupil numbers halved since the 1960s, said there were some grounds for optimism.

The Assembly's TAN 2 guidance on affordable housing would help younger families stay in the countryside, he said. And research by Aberystwyth University, which suggests widening the conditions of on-farm housing to include business use, could be adopted by the Assembly, he added.

After the Royal Welsh Show, the ASSW petition will be circulated at the National and Urdd Eisteddfodau.